Wed By Proxy (Brides of Karadok Book 1)

by Alice Coldbreath

  “Come in!”

  Mathilde told herself she was a fool when her heart leapt. Of course, it was only Prudie with a jug of warm water for washing. She placed it on the side with a clean washing cloth, then banked the fire.

  “Can I get you anything else milady?”

  “No thank you, Prudie. I think I’ll to bed. I’m really quite tired.”

  “Not surprised milady. Not after your busy day.” The maid hovered, and Mathilde looked up expectantly. Prudie took a deep breath. “I expect you’ll be wanting an explanation,” she said and turned rather pink.

  Mathilde blinked. “An explanation?”

  The maid squared her shoulders. “For Waldon turning up this morning like he did,” she said, folding her lips resolutely.

  Mathilde cast her mind back. “Oh, er, well,” she hesitated. “I did notice the salt box was full,” she said tactfully.

  Prudence bit her lip. “Yes, I thought you might.” They both lapsed into silence.

  “I take it Waldon came to visit with you, then,” Mathilde ventured. “You are — friends?”

  Prudence dragged one toe across the rug. “I don’t know as I’d say that precisely,” she mumbled.

  “He is wooing you, then?” suggested Mathilde gently. At a guess she would say Prudence was in her midthirties and Waldon looked to be late thirties if not early forties.

  Prudence’s shoulders rose and fell. “As to that milady… I can hardly say.” She huffed out a breath. “I’ve not — much experience.” She looked as if it pained her a little to admit it. Suddenly, Mathilde’s heart went out to her awkward maidservant. In this respect, they had something in common. “Sometimes I think he is. He’ll call me lass and tip me a wink, but then other times…” She frowned. “I don’t think he can have any partiality for me at all. He’s hard to read.”

  “The important thing is, do you want him to woo you?” asked Mathilde directly.

  Prudie looked as if she would vehemently deny it for a moment. Then she gave a quick nod of her head.

  “Yes,” she all but whispered. “But I’ve got no clue how to bring him up to scratch,” she admitted wretchedly. “For my mother died when I was only knee-high and I am not close to my stepsisters.”

  “So, you’ve come to me?” asked Mathilde, vastly flattered to be considered an authority on men and courting.

  Again, her maid nodded, looking so pathetically hopeful that Mathilde was touched.

  “Do you read?” she asked suddenly.

  Prudie nodded. “Aye, when I’ve the chance.”

  Mathilde stood up from her seat and went to her chest before she could change her mind. Drawing the scandalous book from its recesses, she thrust it into Prudie’s hands. “Read the first chapter at the very least, and see what you think. You will have to be bold indeed if you choose to take it for instruction, but…” She took a fortifying breath. “It worked for me.”

  Prudie gazed down at the book and then back at Mathilde. “Very well, milady,” she said with a spark of hope kindling in her eye. “And thank you milady.”

  “See how you get on with it,” Mathilde recommended. “You may find it’s not for you.” She cringed a little, remembering some of the illustrations and how stern Prudence seemed sometimes. Hopefully it would not turn her hair gray with shock. That might be hard to explain away in the morning.

  After the maid left, Mathilde undressed and washed. She knew Guy was not coming, so she kept on her shift and climbed into bed wearing the thin white robe. For ten minutes or so she lay staring at the ceiling as her eyelids drooped. She thought of her mother, and Nurse and dear Fenella, Gordon, Piers and Willard. Once she was installed at Acton March Manor she would write to her friends and to her mother and let them know that all was as it should be.

  But until then… until then, her position was precarious. She could imagine her mother demanding her return. Lady Doverdale was an important woman at court, after all, and Mistress of the Queen’s Robes.

  Mathilde yawned and rolled onto her side. She longed to feel secure in her position as Lady Martindale but… how could she, when no one had even called her by her title since she had arrived. She frowned over this a moment, until sleep overtook her. Somehow, she had managed to push that fact resolutely from her mind, but it was still a little disquieting when she remembered it.

  When next she woke, she found a large arm wrapped around her waist. Momentary startled out of her wits, she gave a muffled yell.

  “It’s me,” rumbled a voice behind her. She breathed out again in relief and sagged back against him. “I didn’t mean to frighten you,” Guy muttered. “But you were sleeping like the dead when I arrived.”

  “I was so tired,” Mathilde mumbled. She glanced toward the window, but all was still in darkness.

  “Go back to sleep.”

  She let her eyes drift shut again, before a thought occurred to her. “How did you get in?”

  “Your maid is in the kitchen, reading by candlelight.”

  “Oh.” Oh. She almost asked if Prudie had a shocked or horrified expression on her face. Then she decided against it and dropped a hand to rest on his, which was lying against her belly. “I thought you weren’t coming tonight.”

  “I thought the same.”

  She smiled into the darkness. “I’m glad you changed your mind.”

  “I don’t want you getting cold in the night,” he said gruffly.

  “I won’t now,” she said appreciatively, and wriggled against his big, warm body. She heard him catch his breath.

  “Go back to sleep,” he growled. “You’re tired, remember?”

  “I am,” she agreed softly. “You won’t run off before I wake, will you?” Her voice was sleepy yet anxious. When he didn’t answer, she twisted her head back over her shoulder to look at him.

  “I mean to leave early,” he admitted. “I have been … neglecting my duties of late.” He cleared his throat. “I won’t be able to come for a couple of days.”

  “Oh, but…”

  “I’m just here to sleep, Mathilde.”

  Maybe she shouldn’t have lent that book to Prudie, she thought vexedly. Not when she still clearly had need of it herself! Then he squeezed her hip. She realized what it was that was resting against her bottom. He was hard. Oh. She relaxed back against him. Perhaps she had no need of the book after all. He was genuinely being considerate of her, not disinterested. With a soft sigh, Mathilde drifted happily back off to sleep.

  XXV

  When next she woke, Mathilde was once more alone. She rolled onto her back and sighed, wondering what business Guy filled his days with at Acton march. Estate business, no doubt, as by all accounts the estate covered a very large area. She cast her mind back to her brief visit to his ancestral home. A very grand residence it had been too, fit for his station.

  Should she venture to ask him, she wondered, when he would take her back to his official seat? Her instinct urged her to wait. To wait for the moment when he would tell her they would return together as man and wife and he would introduce her to his household. Her heart swelled at the idea, and she clasped her hands over her chest.

  The fact had he had come to the lodge last night, merely to cuddle with her, must be a positive sign surely?

  She wriggled her toes gleefully at the notion he wanted to spend time in her company. Firmly, she put from her mind the last four years she’d spent unclaimed and shunned, a wife in name only. She did not want to dwell on the barren beginnings to their union. Instead she wanted to concentrate on the life that had sprung forth from such unpromising origins. Respect, liking and, dare she even hope for true affection from her spouse? It had not been very heartening being the scorned wife whose husband never laid claim to her.

  Oh, she had known what people said about her in corners where her mother would never hear them. She had been sheltered but not tone deaf. That she was a poor little creature, a pathetic pawn in her mother’s ambitious game. She drew in a breath and exhaled again noisily.
No, she would not dwell on it. She had moved past all that. She had taken a flying jump off the chessboard, and landed squarely on her own playing field which was level and clear, and allowed her to make her own moves.

  Rolling out of bed, she hurriedly washed and dressed herself, a glimpse out of the window told her she had overslept, as did the jug of lukewarm washing water. Prudie must have bought it up at least an hour ago. Venturing below stairs, the only body she came upon was Robin’s cat, Mabel, who rubbed against her legs. She never had returned to Old Helga, thought Mathilde, reaching down to stroke the tabby. The cat made a little noise in her throat and butted her head against Mathilde’s hand.

  “Good morning,” she murmured, and the cat started to purr.

  The sun was shining through the kitchen window, and Mathilde sank down onto the small stool and basked a moment there in the warm rays. Robin and Prudie must have gone to Wickhamford as they had said they would, Mathilde thought. Briefly, she thought of the carter. They must have put him back in a cell the previous night she thought with a frown, or he would surely have died of exposure. He would be having a miserable time of it and no mistake. Then she thought of poor Destrian and the many years he must have suffered at his previous master’s hands and hardened her heart. Maybe he would learn a valuable life lesson, though in truth she doubted it.

  A knock on the window, made her jump, and looking up she saw it was Temur. She gestured to him to come around to the door and made haste to open it. He had a cart with him and seemed to be unloading some apparatus from the back.

  “What is that you have bought with you?” she called.

  He looked back at her over his shoulder. “Wait and see!”

  She watched as he slung two pieces of a large wooden frame over his shoulder and picked up a sack. It was a tapestry loom! Mathilde clapped her hands together. “Where did you get it?”

  “Guy sent me to Helesport to buy it for you. He wanted the very best money can buy.” He swung the bag he carried up in the air. “All the threads are in here. Every color you can imagine.”

  Mathilde caught it clumsily. How thoughtful her husband was. He must have bought it to keep her busy while he could not visit her.

  “Where do you want it set up?” Temur asked, looking about him.

  “Not down here, it’s far too big,” said Mathilde. “The sitting room upstairs would be better suited.”

  He nodded in agreement and carried the two pieces he had up the stairs. “I’ll be back down and collect the other parts next,” he called over the bannister at her.

  “Can I help carry anything in?”

  “No!” he shook his head. “Guy would have my guts for garters!”

  He ran back down the stairs two minutes later and collected the other pieces. “You can direct me how to set it up though,” he said scratching his blonde beard. “It looks a lot more complicated than the one Lettys has at home.”

  “Yes of course,” enthused Mathilde, following him back up the stairs. It didn’t take them long to set up the loom in one corner of the room.

  “It’s a fine one,” she said admiringly, and peered into the bag of threads. “You really did get every color.”

  “Where’s young Robin?” asked Temur, looking about him.

  “He’s gone into Wickhamford to pelt a wrongdoer with rotten vegetables,” she admitted. “Do you remember how we told you about the carter who accused us of being horse thieves?”

  Temur’s eyes grew wider and wider as she told him Guy had exacted his revenge on the previous day.

  “He’s in the stocks? The man you fought with?” spluttered Temur. “Are you in earnest?”

  “Absolutely in earnest,” she assured him. Temur sprang up out of the chair he had been sitting in. “Where are you going?”

  “To take Lettys to Wickhamford,” he told her, as he disappeared out of the room. “She would not miss this for the world! It sounds as good as a day at the fair!”

  “I’m sure it isn’t!” she called after him, but hearing the door slam, realized he had already gone. She turned to Mabel the cat and sighed. “I may as well sort through these threads, I suppose.”

  Mathilde spent an agreeable couple of hours separating all her dyed yarn into heaps. Then she fetched a wooden tray from inside the trunk in her room and arranged them into it in a way that she could easily put her hand to the color she wanted. Then, fetching a sheet of paper and a pen, she set about drafting an intricate design.

  The picture she drew was a rustic scene of a large hunting lodge in the middle of a green wood. Outside the lodge were five hens, a cat, a boy, two women, one with black and one with short hair and two horses. She couldn’t add Guy as strictly speaking he did not live there. Then she decided to add Old Helga with her long gray hair and pale blue dress. In order to show she lived nearby she added the plume of smoke from above the trees. Then she had an excuse to add Guy, for Old Helga did not live with them either. She took great pains to draw out his tall powerful figure with broad shoulders and long legs, adding in his short black beard to make him unmistakable. Then she drew in Waldon with his slim, wiry frame and hint of gray at his temples, and Temur with his blonde hair and youthful face. She would have liked to have added Temur’s wife, but she had not yet met Lettys, so she had no idea how to depict her. The design took her the best part of three hours, as she added meticulous color codes for each detail.

  Suddenly, a noise below stairs startled her out of her absorption. Mabel perked up and jumped down off the chair she had been curled up in. Mathilde set down her pen and sat up. Could it be Rob and Prudie returned already from Wickhamford? Hastily packing her pen and paper away, she made her way below stairs. Finding no one about, she hurried through to the kitchen and came to an abrupt halt. At the kitchen table Prudie was busily chopping mushrooms, but that was not the startling thing. Her maid was not alone. Waldon stood behind her, his arms wrapped around Prudence’s waist, nuzzling her neck. Prudie’s head was angled to allow him access.

  “Oh!” Mathilde started on the threshold. “I am sorry…”

  “Nay, don’t apologize, lass,” said Waldon, taking a step back. “I’ve to head back to the manor now. Was just taking my leave of this one here.”

  “Of course!” Mathilde half-turned to give them some privacy. She fancied she heard the whisper of a kiss, a murmured promise and then the slam of the door.

  “Sorry about that milady,” said Prudie, who was wiping her hands on a cloth and looking a little flustered.

  Mathilde waved her apology aside. “So, you and Waldon?”

  “He gave me his vow this morning,” said Prudie simply. “We’re handfasted.”

  Mathilde gasped, and hurried round the table to embrace her maid. “That was so quick! Why you only read it last night!” she marveled. “What wonderful news!” Prudence was even pinker when Mathilde released her. “Do you have to get it solemnized in a church or any such thing?”

  “Round these parts, the country folks just makes their vows to each other.” Prudie shrugged. “We haven’t told anyone yet,” she admitted shyly. “I wanted to tell you first, milady, as you’d been instrumental so to speak.” She glanced around furtively. “By giving me the means to snare him,” she whispered.

  “You mean the book? Was it of any use?” asked Mathilde, unable to contain her curiosity.

  “Oh yes, miss. Very instructive.” Mathilde hesitated, not feeling she really had the right to ask, but Prudie leaned forward. “I went for the easiest one, milady,” she admitted in a low voice.

  “The easiest one?” Mathilde puzzled, not liking to admit she had only read the first two tales. Maybe there was one later that was a good deal less work!

  “The lusty landlady one,” whispered Prudie. “I wore no undergarments and got him up to my room on the pretext the shelf was broken. Then, when he was examining it, I lifted up my dress and lay across the bed.” She turned scarlet. “I told him I longed for his touch, like the landlady did. Waldon took over then.” She so
unded a little dazed. “For a moment, I nearly lost my nerve thinking he wouldn’t react like that Sir Pelomon did. But he only hesitated for the veriest second before he fell on me, exactly like it said!” Her voice was a hoarse whisper now, her eyes very wide. “He didn’t even try to resist!”

  Mathilde nodded. “Yes, it was the same for me,” she confided. “Only I followed the story of the lusty widow.”

  Prudie’s eyes widened. “With the mouse and the tangled hair?”

  Mathilde grimaced. “I felt a bit of a fool at the time,” she admitted. Prudie gave a startled chuckled. Mathilde bit the side of her mouth. “Truly men are strange creatures,” she managed to get out before her own laughter bubbled up. They both laughed until tears rolled down their faces.

  “If you don’t mind, milady, I’ll just hold on to the book for a while to get a few more pointers,” Prudie said.

  “Oh, of course!” Mathilde was a little taken aback. Clearly Prudie was a much better scholar than she.

  “Only it’s quite a lot to take in,” admitted Prudie. “And Waldon didn’t seem to rush on to all those positions same as they did. He was quite happy just doing the first one all night.”

  Mathilde coughed. “He probably won’t expect you to do all the others at once,” she said blushing. “Indeed, he’d probably think it a little odd if you expected it.”

  Prudie’s eyes widened. “Then how—?” She faltered anxiously. “I don’t want him to get bored of me, milady.”

  Mathilde reached across and patted her hand. “He won’t,” she said reassuringly. “You could always say you had a dream about him doing something to you, and you’d like to try it as it felt so nice. Or say you heard some other wives talking about something and you want to know if married couples really do that. Only when you feel ready mind you,” she cautioned. “That book is just a series of adventures, Prudie. Pelomon does not pledge himself to any of those women, whereas you’ve got your whole married life ahead of you. You’re in no hurry.” Prudence was hanging on her every word now, nodding.